A Couple's Cancer Journey: Tuneshia & Tillard
by Team healtheo360In this interview, Dave chats with Tuneshia & Tillard Gallop. Tuneshia was diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer in 2016. She talks about many aspects of her journey: diagnosis, treatment, and the physical and emotional challenges. Tillard covers his experiences and insights from the perspective of the caregiver. Whether you are newly diagnosed or simply curious about how cancer can affect daily life, this candid discussion is as informative as it is inspiring...
Dave: So, Tuneshia, let’s start with you. You were diagnosed in 2016 at stage 2. Can you tell us what type of breast cancer you were diagnosed with?
Tuneshia: I was diagnosed with invasive ductal carcinoma. It’s an aggressive breast cancer that spreads to other tissues. My cancer was also estrogen positive, hormone positive. That meant that I had a lot of estrogen, and the cancer was basically feeding off the hormones.
Dave: When you were diagnosed, was there something that was going on that you didn’t feel quite right? How did you know to go in to the doctor and say “I think there’s something wrong here”?
Tuneshia: Actually, we were in the process of doing fertility treatment. The day before the last procedure, I noticed this bloody discharge coming from my nipple area. To be honest, I thought it was a cut. I was like, “what’s that?”. I got really nervous and I just had a bad feeling. I guess given my background – I’m a registered nurse — you start thinking of all the symptoms of possible cancers and other things. I was bleeding, and then when I went to the procedure I told the doctor I think we have an issue. Before we go any further, I have this bleeding that’s happening. He got really concerned and said, “Ok, we’re going to send you to a breast specialist to get you checked out.” So, that’s how I was able to find it. The other thing too, the discharge, I kept noticing this rash. I always did breast exams and never felt tumors. It occurs differently for everyone. Mine was itching. I thought at one time it was eczema, but after piecing everything together I knew it wasn’t because it took a while to go away. I was putting creams and everything on it. It eventually did pass, but then I had the other issue with the bleeding. It started in the left breast. Once I went to the breast specialist, she spoke with me and said we’re going to start a series of tests. That’s when I went into the mammogram – I had a repeat mammogram. And then we went through the biopsy with the left breast. When the biopsy came back it said “ductal carcinoma.” You take a deep breath. I couldn’t really grasp that, because when you say “I have cancer” it’s overwhelming. So, I remember speaking with the doctor and she’s really good. She said, “you can get a second opinion if you want.” At that point I had already done research on her, and I said “I’m going to stick with you and we’re going to work this out.” And she said, “OK.” So before we start going through the treatments, she said “well, let’s check the other breast out.” So we got the other breast checked out. Did the biopsy and it came back “cancer.” She gave me a care plan, basically. And we worked together on that care plan. She referred me to an oncologist and he spoke with me about medication treatments. I will say one of them I was kind of battling with him on. It’s called Doxorubicin – it was pretty strong. I was really nervous about taking it because one of the long term effects are heart problems. In my family, we have heart issues so I was really nervous about taking it. I was asking if there were other alternatives, and he eventually told me about Taxotere. We went on with that. I did four rounds of chemo, and after the chemo treatments I did 33 rounds of radiation.
Dave: So, let’s step back for a minute. You’re in the process of fertility treatment, you’re getting ready to see that doctor, you notice a little bleeding from your nipple. You get to the doctor’s office and you being a nurse obviously you knew something was going on here – you had an uneasy feeling. That doctor sent you to who? Did they send you to a surgeon, an oncologist? What was that first step after you left the fertility doctor to go get your breast exam, what doctor was that?
Tunishia: It was actually Dr. Ruddy, the breast surgeon.
Dave: I see, so Dr. Ruddy now is going to coordinate with the other doctors and your care team and put together a plan.
Tuneshia: Right.
Dave: When you started to think about your care plan, were there things that were important to you or not when you thought, “how am I going to get through this cancer journey?”
Tuneshia: Just speaking with her, I think if anything I was so shocked I just said, “you know what? We’re just going to go through with treatment.” Even with the side effects, I was really concerned about the side effects of chemo. Just from knowing a little bit of knowledge, and hearing from other people you take care of with those issues as well. I do remember meeting with the nurse practitioner and she was telling me one of the side effects with the chemo we can counteract with Claritin. And that shocked me because Claritin D is an antihistamine. But she said one of her clients had used it and it helped. So I used the Claritin through the cancer treatments and it helped a lot with some of the side effects. I still had a metal taste. I did have the finger neuropathy. But, when I took the Claritin I noticed that it wasn’t as intense. My thing was just the side effects of the chemo.
When I first met with Dr. Ruddy, she was telling me “you’re going to do the treatments of course, but we’re going to do an MRI and PET scan.” We did those to make sure the cancer was local and not spreading. And it was good that it was not spreading past the breast tissue, it didn’t go into the lymph nodes. And we did the BRACA test too, which came out negative – so that was a big plus. And she told me the options – she was telling me about the surgeries. She said, “I don’t want to give you too much, but I do want to give you a head’s up that you do have the options of having both breasts removed.” And also she had mentioned the uterus as well, because cancer was so prevalent in my family. But she said, since you’re BRACA negative, you can still opt to have the double mastectomy. So, those are some of the things we had talked about initially.
She also included diet, which was really good. To be honest, most doctors mention diet but they don’t really go into detail about it. So she was telling me really to be careful how you’re eating so you don’t pick up too much weight.
Dave: So, Tillard, you’re going through the journey as well. You hear the diagnosis…what goes through your mind as the husband and caregiver?
Tillard: When I first heard the diagnosis, it was a little despairing because we’re newly married. We’ve been married five years strong now, and I’m thankful that she’s still here. But that happened within our third or fourth year of marriage. You don’t expect that you get married and within three years you hear your loved one is going to have cancer or any other terminal disease. Your mind just starts wondering, “Ok, what am I going to do because we’re just starting our life together?” But, once the initial shock was over, I just pulled it together. I just wanted to reassure her and make her as comfortable as she could be. I tried to daily reinforce how beautiful she really is, and that she didn’t have to worry – that I was here for her and that I would be here for her. You hear the horror stories of how some people just leave or they can’t take it or whatever. But, at that point the most vital thing is just to be supportive and sometimes not even to talk, but just listen. Just let them vent, let them talk. Listen to how they feel, and get a sense of their perceptions of what they’re going through. Then you can adjust your focal point to address what they really need.
Dave: Obviously, when a diagnosis like this happens, whether it’s cancer or any other condition, it kind of hits you like a freight train. After the shock of it you say I have to get my act together. Because, #1 I have to strong and supportive. I’m going to be going through the journey just as much as my wife is going through the journey. I’m going to play a different role, I’m not the patient, but I’m going to play an important role of support and caregiving and being there. What were some of the things that you did to clear your head and refocus yourself? Did you rely on a support group, did you rely on friends, or your church?
Tillard: I relied on close friends, but I think what really helped me in this situation is that I helped take care of my mother. My mother had diabetes, so I was used to taking care of someone. Coming up, I took care of my mother, I took care of her for about 10 years. So, I was already in a caretaker mode. After hearing this, that’s why I think it didn’t hit me as hard as someone who may have not been in a caretaker mode from before. I think that’s what really prepared me. I know I can do this because I took care of my mother for two different diseases, and basically being a support system for both. I think that helped me and prepared me a lot.
I like karate, cars, stuff like that. So, I would hang out with some of the guys. They would call and come get me out of the house every now and then. We’d hang out, talk, or go see a movie. So, that was helpful because it gave me an outlet. I wasn’t always needed, I had other people that were helping me out with my wife. I think that’s the most important thing – for both people to have an outlet. Something to turn to where they can have their own space and kind of get a sense of peace of mind. I can do something for myself, then I can go back and continue to do this.
Dave: One of the important roles I think that a caregiver plays is attending the consultations with the medical professionals. Being a second set of ears, able to ask questions, and being able to interpret what’s being said. I hear so many times, “I got the diagnosis, and I saw the mouth moving of the doctor talking, but all I heard was ‘I have cancer.’” The important part of you being that second set of ears — that’s a critical role. You had a little bit of training. Most people are thrown into the caregiver role. There’s no manual you can get that tells you how to be a caregiver, because every case is different. There’s no two that are the same. What are your thoughts about that?
Tillard: It’s very important. I remember sitting there and listening. I was asking a lot of questions because I wanted to make sure of certain things. Especially with them talking about a double mastectomy. I wanted to know if that was really necessary. Are there any other options? What steps do we have to take before we really get to that option? If that does happen, what other surgeries will she need? Will she need radiation, or will it eliminate her having to get radiation? I was shooting out a lot of questions to see what the doctor had to say so that I could get a better grasp and mentally prepare myself. That’s a big step when your spouse is going through that because of the changes to your spouse. A lot of times people take for granted their vows. It says in sickness and health, poor or richer. But, you never think it’s going to be you in those situations – especially so soon in a marriage. You have to really dig deep down inside and say, “this is the person I said I love, this is the person I said I was going to be with ‘til death do us part, and this is what I’m going to do.” You have to make that determination within yourself to say “This is it, we’re going forward and we’re not looking back.” If you can do that, that’s half the battle right there.
Dave: Absolutely. Tuneshia, let’s talk about the treatment plan. You’re sitting with Dr. Ruddy and there’s some options. Step number one in your plan was what?
Tuneshia: Step one was going through the tests. I did the repeat mammogram.
Dave: Help me understand, what is a repeat mammogram?
Tuneshia: The initial one that I had was a yearly mammogram. When I went for that one, it came back dense breast tissue.
Dave: Which happens quite often with women…
Tuneshia: Yeah, so with the dense breast tissue they said we have to do a repeat mammogram.
Dave: So, it was another mammogram, not an MRI?
Tuneshia: I had two mammograms prior to the MRI.
Dave: Ok. So, first mammogram comes back and we see that the breast tissue is pretty dense, it’s hard to really get a true diagnosis. They go back and they put you through the mammogram again, which is an uncomfortable procedure to say the least. So you go through that a second time, and then dense breast tissue again, hard to get a clear image here…and then what do we do?
Tuneshia: When I went to her office, Dr. Ruddy did the ultrasound. That’s when she saw a few of the tumors. And I remember going to a radiologist too. I guess he just wanted to confirm, and he picked up on it as well — that I had the tumors in both breasts. That was the first part. And then I had to do biopsies of both of them so they could find out the characteristics of the tumor.
Dave: So you go into the hospital, and had both biopsies in the same day?
Tuneshia: Well, the first one was for the left breast. When the results came back for that one, she said we should get the other one tested. And that’s when they found the tumors in that one as well.
Dave: They take the biopsy, they send it off to pathology. The report comes back, and the report says…what type of tumor again was it?
Tuneshia: It was invasive ductal carcinoma. Stage 2.
Dave: Ok, so we get the mammogram, we get the ultrasound, we get the biopsy, we get the diagnosis. You sit down with Dr. Ruddy, and she says “Ok we’ve got some options here” and she lays those out in front of you. Now that we found the tumors and we know where they are located, step 1 is what?
Tuneshia: Basically, step one for me was doing the chemo treatment. She said since the type of cancer I had was aggressive, we were going to try and slow the growth and shrink the tumor through the chemo. And then she told me about the option for surgery.
Dave: Ok, so let’s talk about the chemo for a minute. How many rounds of chemo was that?
Tuneshia: I did four rounds of chemo.
Dave: And the regiment was…once a week? Once every other week?
Tuneshia: I think it was every four weeks that I was doing the chemo treatments.
Dave: So, you go to the oncologist, you sit in the chair and they hook you up, and it’s what? A couple hours, 3…4 hours? How long were you sitting in the chemo chair?
Tuneshia: I think mine was a good 4 to 5 hours of being infused with the chemo.
Dave: How did your body react to those chemo treatments? Did you experience exhaustion, did you lose your hair, were you really sick? I met with one woman recently in her early 30s, and other than losing her hair she had no other side effects. Tell me about your experience going through the four rounds of chemo.
Tuneshia: Gosh, that was taxing. It was a lot, I’m going to be honest with you. I remember having neuropathy in my fingers. Going through the physical changes – my hair eventually fell out and that was really overwhelming to see that actual change happen.
Dave: Did Tillard introduce you to his barber?
Tuneshia: Haha! Oh gosh, he’s so supportive. I remember sitting down, I was combing my hair. I went to pick at my hair and it just came out. I started crying. He said, “Hey, you’re going through chemo. This is going to happen.” So, I got some clippers and decided I’m going to have a GI Jane moment. I see it like this: when you’re diagnosed with cancer you go through your crying, you go through your hurt, the rollercoaster of emotions. But, you say “I’m a warrior, let me go ahead and do what I need to do.” I started shaving my hair and I just looked at myself and said, “Who is this?” I didn’t even feel like myself. I felt very tired a lot. I remember the extreme fatigue, the metal taste in my mouth. I couldn’t even eat a lot of foods. My sister told me about one of her coworker’s experiences. Instead of eating with metal, try using plastic utensils. The chemo interacts with your taste buds. So, I did that and it helped a little bit. I didn’t eat a lot of spicy foods because they didn’t mesh well with my taste buds.
Dave: Did you have any GI issues?
Tuneshia: I felt nauseous sometimes. They gave me medication for the nausea, so that helped out a little bit. Also, ginger helped me too. You can do natural ginger or the ginger candies. Those really settled my stomach. I wanted to do an alternative to the anti-nausea medication.
Dave: Was breast cancer in your family?
Tuneshia: Yeah. Actually, when I got diagnosed that’s when I really started digging deeper into the history.
Dave: Do you have sisters?
Tuneshia: I have one sister. A close cousin, she has breast cancer. And I have a male cousin who had breast cancer as well, which was very shocking.
Dave: That’s an interesting point. And, you know Tillard, I’ll give you a tip (haha). Self-exams once a month, even for men. Examine your breasts. Learn how to do a male self-exam. Yes, men do get breast cancer. There is a great organization that I work with called the Male Breast Cancer Coalition, and they do wonderful work in supporting men going through the breast cancer journey. Men have breasts too. So, you have to do a monthly self-exam. It doesn’t take long, learn the proper technique. You can go on the website of the Male Breast Cancer Coalition, and I think they have a demonstration on how to do that. Yeah, so male breast cancer is in your family, you have a cousin…do you know how old she was when she was diagnosed?
Tuneshia: I think she was in her late…I want to say 30s. And we have basically a general family history of cancers on both sides. A lot of colon cancer and breast cancer.
Dave: Here’s the thing about colon cancer as well: If one of your parents is diagnosed with colon cancer, your first colonoscopy needs to be done 10 years prior to the age that that parent was diagnosed. Let’s say your father had colon cancer at 50, then your first colonoscopy needs to be done at 40. That’s a very important thing. When I turned 50, I treated myself for my birthday to a colonoscopy. As funny as that sounds…early detection. Fortunately for me I don’t have that in my family, so I waited until I was 50 to get mine done. A lot of people on the website are going to say, “Dave, you’re not even 50 yet.” I spilled the beans here in this interview haha thank you guys!
Tuneshia: We always tell people, “Be proactive.” You have to be proactive in your health. Because you know your body better than everybody else. I always say know your family history too. That is so important.
Dave: Exactly. Ok so, four rounds of chemo. Then you get through that and Dr. Ruddy says, “Ok.” Now what? What’s the next step here? Surgery?
Tuneshia: Surgery was before the radiation. She basically said if you do the double mastectomy, it decreases the chance of the cancer coming back. Because of the way my cancer was growing, and the family history. That was a tough thing to decide. But I remember looking at her and saying, “Ok, we need to do it. Let’s just do it.” So we did the double mastectomy. I don’t regret it because I really feel like it’s saving my life. She was very supportive, and asked if I wanted reconstruction. I said, “You know what? At this point, no. Just let me ‘live flat’ for now.” It’s a very tough decision concerning my husband as well. Looking at me in a different body image. And even me accepting myself in a different body image. But I knew it was for my health. So, we did the double mastectomy and no reconstruction. After that I went through the recuperation period. The blessing out of this is I was able to take time off work. Since I had so much leave, I was able to take off for the whole summer basically and go through the chemo and surgery.
Dave: After your surgery, did you go through any physical therapy to strengthen your chest area again? Because they remove a lot of breast tissue, but there’s also muscle there. Was there any physical therapy afterward or exercises that you had to do?
Tuneshia: Actually, I did my own exercises. I didn’t mention anything about the exercise part. I remember doing arm exercises for myself. I didn’t do any weight training or anything like that because you can’t lift. But just basically arm exercises to kind of help out. I didn’t have any lymph nodes removed, the cancer didn’t spread there. So, I didn’t do any physical therapy or anything like that. Once I finished with the surgery, I did do my follow up appointments with the oncologist and breast specialist because she wanted to still follow me closely. They basically monitored how I was healing and everything. They didn’t push the reconstruction. They said, “whenever you’re ready for reconstruction, you let us know.” She was very supportive to not push it. She just said, “take your time. Don’t worry about it, you look great. We’ll keep a close eye on you.” After that, she recommended that I go see a radiologist because we want to make sure all of the tissue is taken care of. She was very thorough. So, I met with the radiologist after the surgery. That was like a few months afterwards. In between that I had gone back to work. I kind of paced myself going back to work. One thing I will mention about chemotherapy – chemo brain is very real. I was reading up on it and I was like, “Oh no, that’s not going to happen.” It happened. And I remember going back to work and feeling like “Oh gosh I can’t remember my passwords, I can’t remember how to do the job.” My supervisor was very supportive. She said, “Write everything down. Just start writing things down.” And that’s what I had to do for myself. That took a couple of months. In between that, just getting acclimated back to work. My energy levels were kind of off, so I would just pace myself then. I would go to work and then come home. I remember just taking naps. A lot of naps, sometimes I would take walks to kind of combat the fatigue and everything. Once I had a few months at work…I was still going to the doctors in between that. That’s when she said, “Ok, we’re going to look at radiology.” So, she sent me to a radiologist and that’s when I sat down and spoke with the radiologist. She was saying because of the history and because of how aggressive the cancer was, “We’re going to give you a few rounds of the radiation.” And that’s when I went through 33 rounds.
Dave: Was that every day?
Tuneshia: Every day. I did half days at work. My employers were really good. They worked with me and everything, very patient. I would go to work during the day, and in the afternoon I would go and get radiation treatment. I started January 2017 and February is when I stopped.
Dave: So, a full month of radiation…
Tuneshia: That was really taxing too. It was like I was getting knocked down. But I said, “Ok I have to push through this one too.” I pushed through the chemo, alrighty round two.
Dave: Any oral chemo to cap it all off, or no?
Tuneshia: No. I started taking Tamoxifen in between that, and I’m still taking Tamoxifen now. Those are the anticancer ones that help me out. But going through the radiation and everything, that was pretty tiresome. I remember going through the changes with my skin, and it had gotten so bad that when the radiologist looked at my skin he said, “your skin looks angry,” because I was having burns. That was another change all over again. I said, “What in the world is going on? There’s got to be a purpose to all of this.” I was just taking on too much and really worried about my husband seeing me in this way and then on top of that with the burns and everything. But, I started to doing research on creams. I ordered some cream from Amazon and it helped out.
Tillard: The doctor had prescribed some cream too, but the one from Amazon actually worked better. That was an ordeal too, because I had to help her put the cream on and then put bandages over the areas so that it wouldn’t stick when she put on a shirt. That was something that I wouldn’t want anyone else to go through. It’s hard, but you have to stay strong for that person. You look at them and you say, “Wow, this is really tearing away at the individual.” But you do your best to put on a face, because you don’t want them to get worried from looking at you. You don’t want to have that look. You just want to say in your mind, “Okay.” Just like I go to work. I say, “that’s really tore up, and I just need to fix it.”
Tuneshia: I would ask him, “Which one is worse, the chemo or the radiation?” And I think the radiation took it because when you’re going through that your skin gets so sensitive. You go through all the changes and the burns. I had days where I wanted to look at the doctor and say, “Can we stop? Let’s just stop.” She was very supportive as well, she gave me the silvadene dressing and everything. I was doing some other creams as well. She said, “You’re at that halfway point.” I was at round 20 or so when I just wanted to say, “You know what? Forget this.” But in my mind I said, “You got to do it. Finish it. Just finish it out because this is for your health. You’re almost there.” So, it’s like a marathon, you have to push and I had to really push myself to do it. There were days at work I just wanted to sit at my desk because I was so tired. I remember my employer coming to me and she said, “Why don’t you just take off? Take off, it’s OK. The job will be here, but you have to take care of yourself.” And I ended coming back out of work for the remainder of my treatment. I was really pushing myself to just get through treatments. Once treatment was over, I was happy. It was a relief. Even though I’m still going through the Tamoxifen treatment, but that’s another story within itself. I understand what they mean by “warrior” now. It’s always different when you’re on the other side. I’m a nurse and I’m always taking care of people. When I used to hear “warrior” and things like that I was like, “What do they mean by that?” I used to them going through treatments, and your heart goes out to them but you never actually know how they feel until you actually go through it yourself. So being on the other side, now I understand why they say “warrior.” You’re constantly fighting. You’re fighting the physical aspects of cancer, and you’re fighting the mental part of cancer. I still see my doctors regularly because they want to keep an eye on everything. I had a PET scan to make sure that there’s nothing there. And just really being proactive and making sure I eat healthier. Managing my stress levels, and really taking care of myself. Even when I’m stressed out now I have to learn how to back up and say, “You know what? Let me do this in a new way now. I can’t do it like I used to.” When I was stressed, I used to worry a lot. This time I have to do things totally different.
Dave: Going through cancer kind of puts other things into perspective, doesn’t it?
Tuneshia: Oh gosh, it does…it does. You’re more sensitive to things. You don’t take things for granted. And I know it sounds cliché, but don’t sweat the small stuff. You might hear people complaining, and you’re looking at them like, “Really? You’re complaining over that and there are millions of people fighting with cancer every day.” It’s a lot. Cancer breaks you down. It tears at you constantly. You’re trying to find that strength within you to say, “I’m going to get through this.” I remember talking to my mom and she kept saying, “It’s all in the attitude.” Even my husband, he was very supportive saying, “You got this! Come on, you can do it.” And I’m thinking, “I can’t do this. I can’t. I’m tired. Too tired to do this, too tired to do that.” But you push through regardless. It’s been a tough, tough battle. Looking through scriptures help me get through. A lot of praying and a lot of scriptures. That was one of the things that helped me to push through this cancer situation. It’s an ongoing battle. I remember reading this and it’s sort been my motto: “You eat, you rest, and then you get up and you survive.” Because every day is basically you’re surviving. It’s been a real battle…
Dave: Tillard, I’m going to give you the last word. If you could give advice to other caregivers who are entering the journey and this role of caregiving, what advice would you give them?
Tillard: Remember how much that person means to you…
Check out the 4-Part Series of h360 HealthTalk with Tuneshia's Surgeon, Dr. Kathleen Ruddy:
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